fertile

modif.

1. Said of land

   fruitful, rich, productive, fat, teeming, yielding, plenteous, prolific, black, arable, flowering, bearing, lush, flowing with milk and honey.

   Antonyms sterile*, barren*, desert. *

2. Said of females

   fecund, prolific, generative, bearing, bringing forth, breeding, pregnant, gravid, with child.

   Antonyms sterile*, infertile*, barren. *

3. Said of the mind, imagination, etc.

   inventive, resourceful, imaginative; see original 2.

fertile implies a producing, or the power of producing, fruit or offspring, and may be used figuratively of the mind; fecund implies the abundant production of offspring or fruit, or, figuratively, of creations of the mind; fruitful specifically suggests the bearing of much fruit, but it is also used to imply fertility (of soil or plants) or to that which produces favorable or profitable results, etc.; prolific, a close synonym for fecund, more often carries connotations of rapid production or reproduction and is often derogatory a prolific species, a prolific writer